Mikah relaxed and Jason removed his hand slightly, ready to clamp down if the other’s voice rose above a whisper.
“Of course they are not nice, beasts in human garb is more truthful. I feel no mercy for them and they should be wiped out and blotted from the face of the earth as was Sodom and Gomorrah. But it cannot be done by revolution, revolution is evil, inherently evil.”
Jason stifled a groan. “Try telling that to two-thirds of the governments that now exist, since that’s about how many were founded by revolution. Nice, liberal democratic governments — that were started by a bunch of lads with guns and the immense desire to run things in a manner more beneficial to themselves. How else do you get rid of the powers on your neck if there is no way to legally vote them away? If you can’t vote them — shoot them.”
“Bloody revolution, it cannot be!”
“All right, no revolution,” Jason said, getting up and wiping his hands disgustedly. “We’ll change the name. How about calling it a prison break? No, you wouldn’t like that either. I have it — liberation! We are going to strike the chains off these poor people and restore them to the lands from which they were stolen. The tiny fact that the slave holders regard them as property and won’t think much of the idea, therefore might get hurt in the process, shouldn’t bother you. So — will you join me in this Liberation Movement?”
“It is still revolution.”
“It is whatever I decide to call it!” Jason raged. “You come along with me on the plans or you will be left behind when we go. You have my word on that.” He stomped over and helped himself to some soup and waited for his anger to simmer down.
“I cannot do it… I cannot do it,” Mikah brooded, staring into his rapidly cooling soup as into an oracular crystal ball, seeking guidance there. Jason turned his back in disgust.
“Don’t end up like him,” he warned Ijale, pointing his spoon back over his shoulder. “Not that there is much chance that you ever will coming as you do from a society with its feet firmly planted on the ground, or on the grave to be more accurate. Your people see only concrete facts, and only the most obvious ones, and as simple an abstraction as ‘trust’ seems beyond you. While this long-faced clown can only think in abstractions of abstractions, and the more unreal they are the better. I bet he even worries about how many angels can dance on the head of a pin.”
“I do not worry about it,” Mikah broke in, overhearing the remark. “But I do think about it once in a while, it is a problem that cannot be lightly dismissed.”
“You see?”
Ijale nodded. “If he is wrong, and I am wrong — then you must be the only one who is right.” She nodded in satisfaction at the thought.
“Very nice of you to say so,” Jason smiled. “And true, too. I lay no claims to infallibility but I am sure that I can see the difference between abstractions and facts a lot better than either of you, and I am certainly more adroit at handling them. The Jason dinAlt fan club meeting is now adjourned.” He reached his hand over his shoulder and patted himself on the back.
“Monster of arrogance,” Mikah bellowed.
“Oh, shut up.”
“Pride goeth before a fall! You are a maledicent and idolatrous antipietist….”
“Very good.”
“… And I grieve that I could have considered aiding you for even a second, or of standing by while you sin, and fear for the weakness of my own soul that I have not been able to resist temptation as I should. It grieves me, but I must do my duty.” He banged loudly on the door. “Guard! Guard!”
Jason dropped his bowl and started to scramble to his feet, but slipped in the spilled soup and fell. As he stood again the locks rattled on the door and it opened. If he could reach Mikah before the idiot opened his mouth he would close it forever, or at least knock him out before it was too late.
It was too late. Narsisi poked his head in and blinked sleepily; Mikah struck his most dramatic pose and pointed to Jason. “Seize and arrest that man, I denounce him for attempted revolution, for planning red murder!”
Jason skidded to a halt and back-tracked, diving into a bag of his personal belongings that lay against the wall. He scrabbled in it, then kicked the contents about and finally came up with a metal-forming hammer that had a weighty solid lead head.
“More traitor you,” Jason shouted at Mikah as he ran at Narsisi who had been dumbly watching the performance and mulling over Mikah’s words. Slow as he appeared, there was nothing wrong with his reflexes and his shield snapped up and took Jason’s blow while his club spun over neatly and rapped Jason on the back of the hand: the numbed fingers opened and the hammer dropped to the floor.
“I think you two better come with me, my father will know what to do,” he said, pushing Jason and Mikah ahead of him out the door. He locked it and called for one of his brothers to stand guard, then poked his captives down the hall. They shuffled along in their leg-irons, Mikah nobly as a martyr and Jason seething and grinding his teeth.
Edipon was not at all stupid when it came to slave rebellions, and sized up the situation even faster than Narsisi could relate it.
“I have been expecting this, so it comes as no surprise.” His eyes held a mean little glitter when he leveled them at Jason. “I knew the time would come when you would try to overthrow me, which was why I permitted this other to assist you and to learn your skills. As I expected he has betrayed you to gain your position, which I award him now.”
“Betray? I did this for no personal gain,” Mikah protested.
“Only the purest of motives,” Jason laughed coldly. “Don’t believe a word this pious crook tells you, Edipon. I’m not planning any revolutions, he just said that to get my job.”
“You caluminate me, Jason! I never lie — you are planning revolt. You told me — ”
“Silence both of you, or I’ll have you beaten to death. This is my judgment. The slave Mikah has betrayed the slave Jason, and whether the slave Jason is planning rebellion or not is completely unimportant. His assistant would have not denounced him unless he was sure that he could do the work as well, which is the only fact that has any importance to me. Your ideas about a worker-class have troubled me Jason. I will be glad to kill them and you at the same time. Chain him with the slaves. Mikah, I award you Jason’s quarter and woman, and as long as you do the work well I will not kill you. Do it a long time and you will live a long time.
“Only the purest of motives, is that what you said, Mikah?” Jason shouted back as he was kicked from the room.
The descent from the pinnacle of power was fast and smooth. Within half an hour new shackles were on Jason’s wrists and he was chained to the wall in a dark room filled with other slaves. His leg-irons had been left on as an additional reminder of his new status. He rattled the chains and examined them in the dim light of a distant lamp as soon as the door was closed.
“How comes the revolution?” the slave chained next to him leaned over and asked in a hoarse whisper.
“Very funny, ha-ha,” Jason grumbled, then moved closer for a better look at the man who had a fine case of strabismus, his eyes pointing in independent directions. “You look familiar… are you the new slave I talked to today?”
“That’s me, Snarbi, fine soldier, pikeman, checked out on club and dagger, seven kills and two possibles on my record, you can check it yourself at the guild hall.”
“I remember it all Snarbi, including the fact that you know your way back to Appsala.”
“I’ve been around.”
“Then the revolution is still on, in fact it is starting right now but I want to keep it small. Instead of freeing all these slaves what do you say to the idea that we two escape by ourselves?”